SCOTUS To Hear Obama Employer Sanction Law Challenge

Last Updated: Tue, 12/07/2010 - 5:02pm

Although President Obama vowed to crack down on businesses that hire illegal immigrants, the administration will ask the Supreme Court this week to kill an Arizona measure—signed into law by former Governor Janet Napolitano—that punishes employers who hire undocumented workers.

Upheld by two federal courts, the Legal Arizona Workers Act requires companies to certify that employees are authorized to work in the U.S. by using a federal electronic database known as E-Verify to check the Social Security number and immigration status of new hires. Those caught hiring illegal workers are severely punished and can have their business license revoked.

When she signed the law in mid 2007, then-Governor Napolitano, Obama’s Homeland Security Secretary, said she did it “out of the realization that the flow of illegal immigration into our state is due to the constant demand of some employers for cheap, undocumented labor.â€